Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Wake Up and Smell the Trees: Speed Bumps Ahead

Bicycle racing is about more than just who can ride the fastest, or even about who is physically strongest. Whereas some sports simply reward accuracy (tiddlywinks), or speed (sack racing), or power (watermelon seed spitting), cycling is a Waldorf salad of all of these, dressed with some luck and served in a great big wooden bowl of strategy. While training and preparation are essential for success, one should never underestimate the efficacy of a cunning psychological ploy. Indeed, it was no less a rider than Eddy "The Cabbinal" Merckx who called cycling "the Parcheesi of the road." And so it was that Tour de France winner Alberto Contador struck a potentially fatal blow to his competitors recently by unveiling his very own personalized "fingerbang" car:

A number of readers have alerted me to Contador's new ride, and it will doubtless boost his morale as effectively as it undermines the confidence of his rivals. You'll also note that Contador has abandoned his old fingerbang logoway for something a bit more corporate and abstract:

It could almost be the insignia of a bank or securities firm--albeit one with a disconcerting tendency to try to screw you with an index finger. (Actually, Contador should really consider selling his new logo to Goldman Sachs.)

Of course, there are some people who are simply not interested in the competitive aspect of cycling, and to whom the cutthroat, cockblocking, and fingerbanging world of bike racing is distasteful and off-putting. Instead, they prefer to simply ride around on their bicycles while smelling trees:

However, even the docile world of genteel, non-competitive, "Look at me, I'm saving the Earth!" cycling is not free from competition. Traditionally, here in the United States, the best place to be a tree-sniffing cyclist who prefers self-administered back-pats to fingerbangs (at least according to the "media") has been Portland, Oregon. Recently, though, the foul scent of defeat almost overpowered the usual Portland olfactory medley of trees, coffee, and dirty blond dreadlocks when "Bicycling" magazine crowned Minneapolis the most bike-friendly city in America:

Alas, stunned Portlanders looked on in terror as the Dachshund of Time lost interest in their moist city and instead began sniffing curiously at the fragrant crotch of Minneapolis:

(Recent Fixedgeargallery entry, via a reader. I believe Hüsker Dü may be from St. Paul and not Minneapolis, but honestly most of us don't know the difference.)

Not only that, but they also called Portland "white, young and childless," after which they went ahead and rubbed Portland's nose in the whole Minneapolis thing again just in case they forgot:

Moreover, the article suggests that the Portland lifestyle is an "elite" one that is simply not tenable for those who are not a part of the leisure class, and that it's bike-friendliness is something that cannot be replicated in larger cities.

Naturally, immediately after reading this I headed over to BikePortland, where the latest item of concern was improving cycling in a local cemetery:For all my jokes about Portland, it should be fairly obvious that they are born of jealousy. I am quite fond of Portland, and what New York cyclist does not envy his or her damp siblings to the west? As much as cycling has improved here in New York City, anybody who either does not inhabit or else regularly travels outside of the "Gentri-verse" knows just how difficult (and potentially fatal) riding a bicycle here can be. Naturally, then, when we read about how Portlanders are complaining about the lack of adequate signage in a cemetery we are simultaneously envious and amused. (For much of the country, Portlanders are the princesses sleeping on the pea, while the rest of us sleep on a single Kleenex facial tissue with lotion on top of a bed of nails.) Plus, while bicycles should certainly be given every consideration out on the roads, we can't help but think that perhaps mourning should take priority over cycling in a cemetery. Then again, this is Portland, so instead of banning bicycles the cemetery installed speed bumps--about which the cyclists then complained:

Apparently, the speed bumps were "unfriendly:"

I guess I must not understand the concept of the speed bump, since I always thought the whole point of them was to be "unfriendly" and jarring if you went over them too fast. They're pretty much the opposite of a "pump track," which is probably what Portlanders are going to start demanding next since pretty much the only hardship they still have to deal with is actually pedaling their bicycles. I mean, I suppose it's possible these things inhabit the grey area between "speed bump" and "booby trap," but I think it's also reasonable that people should be able to mourn their dead without having to dodge someone delivering coffee on a porteur bike or hearing the horrific sound of a locally-machined Chris King hub coasting at 20mph.

Anyway, I'm sure the cemetery and the cyclists will work it all out, and in the end what I found most remarkable was the use of a pair of sunglasses for scale:

I'm excited to see that sunglasses have joined milk and babies as an acceptable unit of measurement, though I'm less impressed by the size of the speed bump. Here in New York City we regularly encounter potholes that are like ten sunglasses wide and four sunglasses deep. Now that's a booby trap.

Putting your front wheel in the camera is the bicycle equivalent of "karate hands." Incidentally, if you're wondering, the Big Dummy is about 20 sunglasses long, but it can carry like 57 babies.

So what is the fate of everyday, practical cycling in our nation's cities? Well, I'm not sure, but I do know the SignedDutchBikeDex has fallen, since this bicycle bearing Janette Sadik-Khan's autograph originally sold at auction for $700 but is now on Craigslist for $650:

serious injury resulting from speed bumps? Portlander 1: "Dude, why are you riding your cross bike? This is obviously a Dutch bike commute!"Portlander 2: "Bro, it's because I have to go through that cemetery with the huge speedbumps. I don't want to go down again. I'm running 33psi in these tubies, and I hope everything works out."

Joel Kotkin [...] thinks that places like Portland, San Francisco and Boston have become “elite cities”, attractive to the young and single, especially those with trust funds, but beyond the reach of middle-class families who want a house with a lawn.

Trust funds? They just print that without comment?

Also, if you want a house with a lawn, what you're looking for is not called a city. I'm glad that young families who want houses with lawns don't live anywhere near me. Sounds boring.

Snob, I know what you mean by the "competitive aspects of cycling." This weekend I did the MS Ride from Houston to Austin and whenever I got passed by a pace line of kits riding Cervelo time trial bikes, I would rocket onto their wheel. Since this was not a race, it made little sense, but I had brief fanatasies of dropping them like Fabian at a C race.

I will say one thing Portland does better than anywhere else is internet commentary. It's not all perfect, but at least the first 10 comments on each article are a little more substantial than "First!"

I'm not satisfied until someone posts a fixie fashion magazine spread of a guy in full MC Hammer regalia. The real mid-80s MC Hammer, with the parachute pants too, not the one that went all ´gangsta´ in the early 90s.

Here in Seattle, we have a small island just east of us in Lake Washington- Mercer Island- that draws many local athletes, and across which I ride to and from work. The council is trying to pass an ordinance that will require cyclists to stop and pull over if (even a single) car is behind them. This is the same place where, 2 years ago, I was given a $248 ticket for "failing to stop" at 2 stop signs. Apparently, a stationary track stand is not stopping, and when I tried to point out that I had indeed reached 0 mph and waited for my right away, they still put me in the back of the cruiser and called back-up since I failed to put my foot down. Cycling in the northwest...

"... I think it's also reasonable that people should be able to mourn their dead without having to dodge someone delivering coffee on a porteur bike or hearing the horrific sound of a locally-machined Chris King hub coasting at 20mph."

I'm going to spend a day walking around my neighborhood repeating this sentence to everyone I come into contact with just to see what happens.

So now we have a new standard for measurement, the "Bar Mitzva Sunglasses Unit," or "BSU." You will no longer ride a 56 cm frame, you now ride an 11 BSU, and you can ignore the pointless and annoying qualifiers, such as "center-to-center," "center-to-top," and so on.

Instant pro-post empathy revisited.I regularly crank up my ATB to 20ish mph at the top of a long descent through a locale of the lawnways persuasion. The noise of my coasting Hope's pawl always scares the shit out of me. Lob only knows what those poor families must think!(Karate Hands?)

I had that happen to me way back in 1990 for going the wrong way on Vanderbilt. The fat cop taco'ed my rear wheel, which bounced into his leg slicing his hide after I threw it on the ground in disgust. I got to spend the night in jail for that one while facing the prospect of a lot more time inside for assaulting an officer! The best part is that the same cop was later busted in some sort of extortion scheme. Ah such memories...

Mercer Island is the nastiest speed bump in the Northwest. Don't think I've witnessed a crash on it or anything, but the cops there have too much tax money, and waaayy too little to do. I used to commute that way too. Ended up going around the north end of the lake eventually. (Thank you King County Parks System's bike trails. Yes, the miles are farther, but it's soooo easy. Like riding in Portland or something.)

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About Me

While I love cycling and embrace it in all its forms, I'm also extremely critical. So I present to you my venting for your amusement and betterment. No offense meant to the critiqued. Always keep riding!